Karen J. Laakko
Author of the Beyond the Hostile Sky Cycle
About the Author
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​Karen J. Laakko has been writing since the age of five and quickly gravitated to fantasy and related genres. She is Ivy League-educated and has studied Latin, Classical Greek, Linguistics, classic literature, and more! She loves bringing all of this knowledge together to develop and enhance her fictional worlds.
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Karen works in a variety of language-related fields, such as editing. In her free time she enjoys playing video games, learning new languages, watching sports, and searching for obscure bands to listen to.​ Her first passion, though, is writing!
In this series, a realm has fallen. As the characters move through space and time, can they save it?
The light has fallen, and both past and future hang in the balance....
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In the northern reaches of a desolate world stands a fallen realm, its sky tainted by an unnatural darkness that is slowly threatening other regions. As three explorers pick their way through the ruins in an effort to find out what happened, they learn that the truth extends farther than they could ever have imagined--across both time and space. The realm has hidden histories, its enemies taking many forms, and it isn't long before the explorers find themselves confronted with a living reminder of this distant past.
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The Beyond the Hostile Sky Cycle is a genre-blending epic, bringing together elements of fantasy, military science fiction, and limited time travel. This initial installment introduces a colorful and mysterious fantasy world near the end of the series' timeline, after generations of interaction between magical and technological societies.
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This volume also includes a three-chapter preview of the next book, Beyond the Hostile Sky!
As the Earth Shrine crumbles into rubble, strange energy readings are picked up by spaceship sensors....
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Spirited young Pyr is training to be a fire mage, assisted by the handsome water mage Aneuthen, but a war is raging. In the depths of space, a powerful fleet has been battling a silent, logic-defying enemy, whose interests seem to cover magic as well as technology. As the conflict intensifies and makes itself known to Pyr, she faces the collapse of everything she had previously relied on. Defenseless but determined, she and new allies can save their world only if they travel to unfamiliar domains--and learn to listen, forgive, and hope.
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The second and chronologically earliest installment, Beyond the Hostile Sky is the heart of the cycle. In bringing the fantasy and sci-fi worlds together for the first time, it lays the groundwork for what is to come, but without forgetting the world that was introduced in After the Breaking. Uncover the intrigue and betrayals that started it all!
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On the other side of the galaxy, an ominous light shines.
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The war is finally over, and those who fought it have scattered, but the danger has not passed. Very soon, troubling incidents in far-flung locations begin to point to an enemy that is at once new and familiar--tacitly involved in the prior conflict, and also tied up in many people's pasts. From mages to pilots to heroic figures, the galaxy's protectors must face what holds them bound and take action. Otherwise, they may find their pasts nullifying the futures of Tetrachtha, multiple fleets, and even Aktinos.
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This third and middle installment continues the narrative that was begun in Part 1 - Beyond the Hostile Sky. While tracing more of the arc between Part 1 and Part 0, it balances the usual blend of action and imagery with important character-level insights. In this way, it begins to intertwine the fates of individual people with the fates of worlds.
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